Friday, February 19, 2016

The Fat Lady Has Not Sung, But Is She Warming Up?

There are three remaining pieces of legislation regarding the transfer the power to approve charter schools from local school
boards to the State Board of Education:

HB3 (Del. Robert B. Bell) provides for a referendum on the November 8, 2016, ballot to
approve or reject an amendment to grant the Board of Education the authority to
establish charter schools.

HJ1 (Del. Robert B. Bell) Grants
the Board of Education authority to establish charter schools. This provides the wording of the Constitutional Amendment.

SB734 Subject to the results
of a voter referendum on a related constitutional amendment, the bill permits the
Board of Education to grant a charter application previously denied by the
local school board.

HB3 and HJ1 should both be
heard in the Senate Committee on Privileges and Elections Tuesday. The committee meets at 4 PM. Should HB3 and HJ1 fail to report, SB734 is
rendered meaningless, as it contains an enactment clause requiring that the Constitutional
Amendment called for in HB3 and HJ1 is approved by the voters. If HB3 and HJ1
fail, that question will not be on the ballot.

The House Education
Committee’s Education Innovation
Subcommittee will take up SB734 at 7:30 on Monday morning. A very similar bill, Del. Lingamfelter’s
HB565, made it all the way to the House floor where he re-referred the bill
back to the House Education Committee which he knew would not meet again before
Crossover. I suspect that either
Lingamfelter sensed that he did not have the votes for passage, or he was
disappointed that the bill was amended by Delegate Albo to require that either the
state or the entity seeking the charter pay for the construction of the school
if the state Board of Education approved the charter. Delegate Albo plans to seek the same amendment
to SB734 should it reach the House floor.

HB3 and HJ1 should both be
heard in the Senate Committee on Privileges and Elections Tuesday (P&E). The committee meets at 4 PM. The Senate already rejected the Senate
Companions to these measures, SB588 and SJ6.
You will remember that SB588 failed on a tie vote. SJ6 failed on a 19-Y 21-N vote.

We have reason to believe that
the valkyrieBrünnhilde
may do her best rendition of Götterdämmerung on
some time after 4 on Tuesday. Your calls and emails to subcommittee and committee members may encourage the good Valkyrie to continue warming up.